


The Loch

by flyingcarpet



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Loch Ness Monster, Picnics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-01
Updated: 2010-09-01
Packaged: 2018-02-21 19:49:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2480330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingcarpet/pseuds/flyingcarpet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A summer picnic at Loch Ness sounds like a fun way to spend the afternoon, but there are hidden dangers in store for Harry and Ginny.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Loch

"Ready to go?" Harry asked, hovering six feet above the grassy shoreline, and looking down at the top of Ginny's head. "That kelpie's not going to see itself, you know."

"You Gryffindors, always in a rush," Ginny said, grinning up at him. "Give me a minute." She dug through her knapsack, which contained a picnic lunch prepared by her mum, meaning that even at a shrunken size it was enormous. Eventually she found out a pair of Muggle sunglasses and slipped them on her nose. "All right," she said, pulling on her knapsack and picking up her broom. "Let's go."

They set off over Loch Ness at a quick pace, soon leaving the forested hills and sloping shore behind. Harry threw his head back and dipped close to the surface of the water, enjoying the feel of the wind in his hair and the spray of the water on his face. It was a beautiful day in the Scottish Highlands, with the sun shining through the clouds and a cool breeze stirring up whitecaps on the murky water. He looked to his left and right, wanting to share it with Ginny, and only then did he realize that she was not at his side.

Slowing, Harry dropped back until he was flying alongside her, then leaned back and watched Ginny fly. Despite the fact that this was only a fun summer outing, she flew in perfect Chaser form, her arms bent at right angles and her spine straight. Her broom made a beeline across the lake, aiming directly for their island destination with not so much as a waver. He wondered when she had started flying like that: the summer he'd been away hunting horcruxes? The year of the Carrows? The summer of grieving? Or was it the past year of long-distance owls and auror training? There were so many options, so many moments that he'd missed out on.

It wasn't only her flying style that was different now; he'd noticed it this morning when he had knocked on the door of the Burrow unannounced and asked her out for an impromptu picnic. Standing in the living room of her family home, where he'd seen her a thousand times before, she looked achingly familiar and yet somehow fundamentally different. She was taller now, longer and leaner than the girl in his memory; her hair was shorter and curlier, a riot of waves around her head; even her face was changed, with a hard line to her mouth that hadn't been there before.

"There's Kelpie Island," he said in a loud voice, pointing across the water as their destination came into view. It was a small, lonely island near the western shore of the narrow loch, named after the shy but dangerous creatures that lived in the waters nearby. A tall stone observation tower sat in the center of the island on a grassy knoll surrounded by trees. It was quiet and serene, shielded by magic from the Muggle tourists that swarmed the edges of the loch.

Ginny looked over at him and gave him a faint smile. Her mouth moved as if she were speaking, but Harry couldn't hear her words. "What?" he shouted. In response she only shook her head and pointed to the island, as if to say 'I'll talk to you when we get there.'

\----------

 

As they flew, Ginny looked across the water at Harry. Right after take-off he had rushed ahead on his broom, flying quick and low over the surface of the water. Ginny hung back and flew at a more sedate pace, her knapsack weighing her down and the new broom beneath her an unknown quantity.

She watched Harry from beneath her lashes. He looked different now: the way he sat his broom was more relaxed and confident, his shoulders broader and his hair longer, more like Sirius than ever. When he'd arrived at her house this morning, his eyes had been full of mischief and humor, but underscored with dark circles, too. He looked more mature and sure of himself now -- and yes, more attractive as well. He was an Auror, not a schoolboy.

A part of Ginny felt as though she hardly knew this handsome, confident Auror. What had happened to the boy she'd fallen for at school, the Harry of Common Room kisses and sweaty palms, who played exploding snap and wizard's chess and never knew how to talk to people? She tried to remember the last time they'd spent any real, quality time together. There had been a few hours here and there during Christmas break, although Easter had been ruined by Harry's investigation of that Dark wizard in Kent. Last summer there had only been a few weeks before Harry was off to the Academy, and it was all a discordant blur of funerals and victory celebrations. Before that was... battle. With a shock, Ginny realized that they had not spent more than an hour or two alone in nearly two years.

Ahead of her, Harry looked around him, and then fell back to fly at her side. There was still a wide gulf between them, though, and when he turned to speak to her, the wind tore the words from his mouth so that she could not hear a thing he said. "I can't hear you," she yelled. His lips moved again, but she heard nothing, so she shook her head and pointed toward the island. They could talk when they got there.

\----------

 

Harry watched Ginny as he flew, even though they were too far apart to speak. He let his broom fly low, close to the surface of the water, and leaned off to the side to dip his hand in the water. As soon as his fingers touched the surface of the loch, a jet of water shot up and arced through the air toward Ginny. She dipped and dodged, and although the rushing air was all he could hear, he saw the broad smile on her face and the way the sun reflected off her shining copper hair. Right in that moment he felt like the luckiest wizard alive.

As he watched, he saw the smile on her face twist suddenly into horror, and her broom jerk around in its path. The first thought that flashed through his mind was that something had happened to her, but on second thought he realized that the expression of horror on her face was directed back toward _him_.

Turning his eyes to the water below, where he'd been playing around a moment before, he saw a giant muscled tentacle emerge from the waves and reach for him unerringly, like a niffler to gold.

It was the last thing he saw before he was plunged into the cold, murky water.

\----------

 

"Harry!" Ginny shouted.

In the blink of an eye, she pivoted her broom and aimed it toward the surface of the water, dropping like a stone toward the spot where Harry had disappeared. The water there was marked with frothy white, a bright sign directing Ginny where to go.

As she dove toward the loch, she pulled out her wand and aimed it straight ahead.

"Accio Harry!" Ginny shouted. The wind pulled the words right from her throat, but something must have gotten through to her wand, because she felt the power of the spell rip through her arm, strengthened by panic and adrenaline and other things she wasn't ready to name.

The surface of the water bulged outward, swelling like the green bud of a _Mimbulus Mimbletonia_ ready to blossom. Ginny gritted her teeth and kept her wand pointed straight ahead, putting all her will and strength into the spell. She had almost reached the surface when a long, green tentacle popped through the watery bubble and into the air, flailing dangerously close to her ankle.

" _Accio_!" Ginny shouted again, and Harry's body came loose from somewhere below the loch and hurtled through the air toward her, limp as a rag doll.

Ginny had played Quidditch for years, won two House championships and broken the single-season scoring record, but this was the most important catch she had ever had to make.

With a wordless cry, she flung her broom sideways, steering with her knees and straining to intercept the path of Harry's limp figure. Her fingers grazed the fabric of his shirt and clasped reflexively, catching his sleeve and holding him in midair, only a meter above the loch. None of them moved for a long moment: Ginny hovering on her broom, Harry hanging by his sleeve below her, and the serpent in the murky water below them. Slowly, the thin fabric of Harry's thin cotton shirt began to give way under his weight, and first one button and then another popped off and dropped into the loch with a soft splash. Several thickly muscled tentacles stirred back and forth just below the surface of the water.

Cursing, Ginny clenched her wand between her teeth to free up both hands and leaned forward to grab Harry more securely by his arms. With a heave, she managed to pull him up onto her broom, draping his body so that his head and shoulders were on one side and his arse and legs were on the other, right in front of where she sat. She steadied him with both hands while she steadied her broom with her knees and tried to fly as fast as she could, aiming up and away from the surface of the water and toward the sanctuary of the island.

The flight across the loch felt as though it were miles long, as Ginny tried to hold Harry in place and prevent him from falling back into the water below. The wind, which had felt refreshing and cool only a few minutes before, buffeted her as she flew and threatened to drive her off-course. Her hair blew into her eyes and blocked her vision, and Harry swayed dangerously, slipping first one way and then the other across the handle of her broom.

"Please be all right," she muttered under her breath, even though she knew that Harry couldn't hear her. "Please don't die. Merlin, Harry, please just don't die."

By the time they finally reached the tiny island, Ginny's arms were aching and her forehead was beaded with sweat. She let down her broom on the flat stone roof of the tower, and lowered Harry carefully to lay on the floor. High stone turrets surrounded them on all sides, and the constant roar of the wind was finally gone.

Harry coughed weakly, and Ginny felt her heart stutter back to life. "Oh, thank Merlin," she said. "You're still alive."

She remembered it pounding through her head like a spell -- _alive alive alive alive alive Harry's alive_ \-- on that awful day at Hogwarts, a single moment of stillness and certainty amid the long hours of fear and battle and blurred motion. Ginny had looked up and seen him dead, his body cradled limp in Hagrid's arms, and the horror of it had stopped her in her tracks, petrified her in place for minutes. She might still be standing there if it weren't for him waking up, and then all she could think was _alive alive alive_.

This was hardly the same situation, but once again, she saw Harry's body limp and weak before her, and once again she was thinking, _Harry's alive_. This time, though, there was no one else to take charge, no one else to do what needed to be done except for her.

Harry coughed again, and a little bit of lake water dribbled across his cheek. With a start, Ginny realized what she needed to do. Using both hands, she rolled Harry to his side. Holding him there carefully, she groped around for her discarded wand, and when she found it she cast a spell that her mother had used when she was little, and Fred convinced her to drink half a bottle of Sleakeasy's Hair Potion.

He coughed again, and then retched, and a moment later a veritable river of lake water spewed out of his mouth and across the stony floor. Harry's arms twitched, and his eyelids fluttered, and Ginny held his shoulders in place and rubbed his back gently with one hand until he was done. She made sure he was breathing steadily, then she dug in her knapsack, pulled out the chequered blanket that she'd brought along for the picnic, and draped it over him.

Retreating to the edge of the turreted platform, Ginny sat down with her back against the stone wall and her knees drawn up in front of her, watching Harry as he lay still. He had coughed up enough water to drown a thestral, and he was breathing again, and she didn't know what else to do. Wait for him to wake up, she supposed. They could not Apparate away from this island, protected from curious Muggles as it was by spells and wards, and flying back across the loch seemed far too risky. She'd managed to get across a small distance while carrying Harry, but she didn't know if she could make it all the way.

Harry's face was pale, and the purple marks under his eyes seemed even darker now that he was still and expressionless. His wet hair stuck to the sides of his face and neck, and bits of seaweed were tangled in his shirt collar.

Ginny bit her lip and twisted the bottom of her t-shirt between her fingers. When Harry had appeared at her house this morning with his broom and a surprise outing in mind, she had almost told him no. She had things to do, preparations for her trip to Holyhead next week, and she didn't want to ruin all that for a boy she'd barely seen in months. A part of her mind had even thought, _Why bother? Why bother having a boyfriend if you never even talk to him? At this point he's only a pen-friend anyway, you don't even get to--_

Seeing him in front of her like this, Ginny knew that part of her mind had been wrong. Harry was much more than any other boy, much more than someone she'd hardly seen in months or someone who wrote blotchy, brief letters and couldn't tell her anything about his investigations. He was _Harry_ , Harry with the green eyes full of mischief, Harry who dreamed up picnics and surprises, Harry whose kisses she'd missed and whose embrace she'd dreamed of for months.

Ginny could not let him slip away from her. She would not.

\----------

 

When Harry opened his eyes, the light was different. Instead of the lingering patches of fog and soft morning breeze, the strong, yellow light of afternoon shone down on him from a blue summer sky. He remembered the sight of the thick green tentacle reaching for him, and the shock of hitting the cold water, but nothing after that. Yet he was definitely not underwater now.

Turning his head slowly, Harry saw a blurry red-haired figure sitting only a few feet away. He tried to say her name, but his voice produced only a sort of croaking sound.

Ginny heard him anyway, because she rushed to his side, scrambling awkwardly across the stone floor on her hands and knees. "Harry! Are you all right?"

"I can't see anything," he said, squinting up at her. At this distance, her face was clear enough, but beyond Ginny, the rest of the world dissolved into hazy, indistinct patches of color.

"Why not?" she asked. Her fingers touched his temples and tenderly brushed back his hair. Harry smiled at her, enjoying the contact.

"Where are my glasses?" he asked. "What happened?"

"You were attacked by something in the lake," Ginny said, then added dryly, "I'm afraid your glasses didn't make it."

"I remember being attacked," Harry said, sitting up slowly and wincing at the feel of bruises around his middle where the creature's tentacles had wrapped around him. "And you pulled me out?" he asked, because it seemed unlikely that the creature had just changed her mind and let him go.

"Yeah," Ginny said. "I was kind of worried for a while there." Her words seemed casual, but her voice wavered as she spoke and her eyes were full of emotion. She seemed entirely different from the cold, distant girl he had seen at the Burrow earlier that day; now, she was more like the Ginny he had known at school, the Ginny who was thoughtful and caring, who loved Harry and didn't care who knew it.

Harry found Ginny's hand with his own and gave it a squeeze. She drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly and unevenly, and some of the sparkle returned to her eyes.

"I guess that was the famous kelpie, eh?"

Ginny grinned suddenly. "I think so," she said. "You got an up-close and personal visit with her. Imagine what all those Muggle tourists would say."

"They'd say I was the luckiest man in Britain," Harry said, his eyes trained directly on Ginny's face. "And I'd say they're right."

He drew her closer for a kiss, pressing his lips to hers and wrapping his arms tightly around her.

Beyond the invisible island, an oversized kelpie searched the loch for a meal, and Muggle tourists trained their binoculars on the surface of the water, seeing nothing. Harry and Ginny did not spare a thought for any of them; they had more important things to do.  



End file.
